sábado, 22 de noviembre de 2014

Real Quick: Two For One

Strategic decisions can change the outcome of a game. There are teams, and players, who are ready to get small advantages that end up being really important. One more time, the small details can be the difference between winning and losing.

A very good example are the "two for one" situations in the end of quarter (for more info check this interesting article) A team will have two scoring opportunities while the other team will only have one. It's no surprise that the example I'm using today comes from the San Antonio Spurs:

With 34 seconds left in the first quarter, San Antonio gets the ball. They play a quick offense, which Golden State don't appear to expect. Ginobili and Baynes run a ball screen situation, with the argentinian driving hard to the basket, and Baynes following and finishing off the offensive rebound (mismatch situation = offensive rebound opportunity!)

The Warriors have 29 seconds for their offense, and they (patiently) run one of their ball screen sets. The Spurs get the stop and they have what they were looking for, an "extra" possession which they are close to finish running the fastbreak… Finally they have a baseline out of bounds situation, which they use to create another scoring opportunity for Ginobili, who does his job and scores.

In the last three plays of the quarter, San Antonio outscores Golden State 4-0, which is a very important advantage! Great preparation and execution.